New UN statistics reveal uneven global economy

New United Nations statistics released today show that a billion dollars can mean a lot or a little, depending on the national context.

The UN Conference on Trade and Development's (UNCTAD) Handbook of Statistics 2003 points out that Brazil's revenue from coffee exports declined by $1 billion between 1999 and 2001 while Slovenia took in $1 billion in tourist expenditures in 2001. "When it comes to magnitude, everything is relative," UNCTAD says.

The same $1 billion is the amount of gross domestic product (GDP) shared by 27,000 Norwegians - and by 10 million Ethiopians, according to the agency. It is the total in tariff revenues on manufactured product imports collected by Indonesia, Algeria or South Africa.

A billion dollars is the amount of foreign direct investment inflows to Argentina in 2002, as well as the annual level of trade among the 15 small members of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM). It is 0.6 per cent of the European Union's (EU) agriculture value added or 11 per cent of the value of Africa's total agriculture exports to the EU in 2001, UNCTAD said.

One billion dollars also represents 10 per cent of the estimated value of India's total remittances from abroad, or 10 per cent of that country's trade deficit, according to the Handbook.